One nation, not just speaking English

[Ban Hammer 13,352]

welsh people don't speak english.. it's some kind of elfin dialect

i talked to a guy from wales once - had to have an english guy translate it.

Was he speaking Welsh or English with a Welsh accent?

it seemed to be english, but i couldn't sort out ####### he was saying.

they seem to be allergic to using vowels in their words

the best way i can characterize it is take someone with a speech impediment and give them a case of beer.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Hold on...stay focused on your argument. You said that most Europeans learn to speak English because it's a marketable language. I'm asking a simple question - is the Spanish language marketable in the U.S. comparitive to English in Europe?

yes if I want someone to clean my toilet.. :rofl:

Edit. What is real funny is that the people I know who are actually from Spain think the Latino version of Spanish is quite ghettoized.

What is the Latino version of Spanish? Anyway, this argument is similar to that between Portuguese speakers in Portugal and those in Brazil. To mose Spanish speakers - and here I'm including myself since I'm a native Spanish speaker - Castillian Spanish is an older version of the language.

Yeah I wondered about that too. Its a common misconception that there is some concept of "linguistic purity" no such thing really. You have different dialects of the same basic language, but the key point is that each dialect meets the communicative needs of the speakers. For other people to say so-and-so is "ghettoised" requires making a value judgement that assumes that one group of people set some sort of quality standard for an entire language.

Its not like languages are fixed in time and don't evolve - we're constantly adding new words and colloquialisms. The rules change pretty much all the time.

Edited July 11, 2008 by Number 6

[Chica Yeyé 41]

Hold on...stay focused on your argument. You said that most Europeans learn to speak English because it's a marketable language. I'm asking a simple question - is the Spanish language marketable in the U.S. comparitive to English in Europe?

yes if I want someone to clean my toilet.. :rofl:

Edit. What is real funny is that the people I know who are actually from Spain think the Latino version of Spanish is quite ghettoized.

What is the Latino version of Spanish? Anyway, this argument is similar to that between Portuguese speakers in Portugal and those in Brazil. To mose Spanish speakers - and here I'm including myself since I'm a native Spanish speaker - Castillian Spanish is an older version of the language.

Yeah I wondered about that too. Its a common misconception that there is some concept of "linguistic purity" no such thing really. You have different dialects of the same basic language, but the key point is that each dialect meets the communicative needs of the speakers. For other people to say so-and-so is "ghettoised" requires making a value judgement that assumes that one group of people set some sort of quality standard for an entire language.

Its not like languages are fixed in time and don't evolve - we're constantly adding new words and colloquialisms. The rules change pretty much all the time.

It is a misconception indeed. There is NO SUCH THING as "Latino Spanish". Each individual citizenry/ancestry group (oh yes, sorpresa, we come from more than 12 different countries, so LatinLand does not exist) has a particular vernacular version of Spanish. Even within countries, each region has their own tones and lexical mannerisms. B

As per bilingualism as policy, I personally don't think it is either desirable or enforceable., and it is certainly fraught with both political and conceptual time bombs It is quite non-nonsensical, really. This country has so much racial and linguistic richness that the way to go, in my obviously uneducated opinion, is to offer second language choices in the K-12 that serve the populations which reside in the area. Most respectable universities require the command of a foreign language as a graduation requirement, for ALL students, heritage and non-heritage learners. I have said it previously, being monolingual in such a globalized world is nothing to be extremely proud of.

Peace, L.

[lucyrich 20]

I agree with Senator Obama on this point.

It's absolutely vital that ALL Americans grow up with English, because English is our national language.

But it's also very useful for Americans to grow up learning another language. And I don't mean just offering a French class starting in ninth grade. Someone who waits until their teen years to start studying a language will likely never be truly bilingual, and will at least have a thick accent. Language study needs to start early in life, and continue.

Our society is well served by having some Americans who know a variety of languages. Spanish is an obvious choice for many, but I don't really care whether it's Spanish, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Urdu, or something else.

Even though some language knowledge may help some people get some jobs, that's not the only reason to do it. Every young kid in our schools learns American History. How many of them go on to be employed as American Historians? Kids learn baseball, music, art, and a bunch of other things that are less commonly useful on the job than a second language would be. The reason most kids should become bilingual is to give them cultural perspective, as much as anything. If it has a side effect of making them more employable, that's a great bonus.

We're working to try and raise our daughter to be truly bilingual. We don't want her to have a first language and a second language; we'd like her to have two first languages. It's not going to be easy.

[jundp 191]

I speak southernese

Me too. And a weird version of Spangligermish.

welsh people don't speak english.. it's some kind of elfin dialect

I want to go to Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch someday.

It is a misconception indeed. There is NO SUCH THING as "Latino Spanish". Each individual citizenry/ancestry group (oh yes, sorpresa, we come from more than 12 different countries, so LatinLand does not exist) has a particular vernacular version of Spanish. Even within countries, each region has their own tones and lexical mannerisms. B

Wait a minute. There's no LatinoLand? All this time I thought............

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

I speak southernese

Me too. And a weird version of Spangligermish.

welsh people don't speak english.. it's some kind of elfin dialect

I want to go to Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch someday.

It is a misconception indeed. There is NO SUCH THING as "Latino Spanish". Each individual citizenry/ancestry group (oh yes, sorpresa, we come from more than 12 different countries, so LatinLand does not exist) has a particular vernacular version of Spanish. Even within countries, each region has their own tones and lexical mannerisms. B

Wait a minute. There's no LatinoLand? All this time I thought............

That sounds like a theme park...

[jundp 191]

Wait a minute. There's no LatinoLand? All this time I thought............

That sounds like a theme park...

That would be the best theme park ever.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Wait a minute. There's no LatinoLand? All this time I thought............

That sounds like a theme park...

That would be the best theme park ever.

Well it would be a close call...

LatinoLand or LatinoWorld

You decide

[ginger1981 0]

My dad teaches adult ESL classes...and there is a huge demand for them. I think it is a generalization that "all latino immigrants...or even most...refuse to learn English."

I think also teaching kids Spanish is a no brainer...in the US it is the foreign language they are most likely to encounter. I took French in college for a few years, and I only came upon 1 person where I lived who was French and I could communicate in the language with. On the other hand...the Spanish I used in high school I could practice outside the classroom on a daily basis.

It's a tough language to learn, give them a break if they don't learn it within a couple years.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Given the huge number of people in this country who speak Spanish at home, won't they pretty much corner the market on jobs that require Spanish speaking skills?

[almaty 19]

got my new spanish book

[jundp 191]

I teach EFL students and English is a hard language to learn.

It depends on where you live in this country whether or not Spanish or French is useful. Where I'm from it's French.

The point is that learning a foreign language early in life (start before high school) is beneficial to the STUDENT...forget for a minute about jobs and interaction with others...from a purely educational standpoint, the process of learning and practicing a foreign language helps a student in many other aspects of learning. Just like art and music.

[amiquechu 0]

After a substantial speech decrying the current state of bankruptcy law in the United States, Barack Obama took a few questions from the audience in Powder Springs, Georgia on Tuesday morning. One young woman asked whether there was anything he could do to prevent teenagers from dropping out before they completed high school, and added, almost as an afterthought, that "there should be a push more for our citizens to become bilingual here in America."

Obama first loosened up the crowd with some well-worn jokes about the "brothers" in the audience who were "overrated" in their "own minds" as to their NBA or rap star potential.

"Maybe you are the next Lil Wayne, but probably not, in which case you need to stay in school."

(And people think there are no differences between the two major American parties! Lil Wayne jokes almost never make appearances during McCain town halls.)

Obama then made some routine comments about the importance of better educating young people so as to compete in the global economy. Then he turned to the issue of bilingualism.

You know, I don't understand when people are going around worrying about, "We need to have English- only." They want to pass a law, "We want English-only."

Now, I agree that immigrants should learn English. I agree with that. But understand this. Instead of worrying about whether immigrants can learn English -- they'll learn English -- you need to make sure your child can speak Spanish. You should be thinking about, how can your child become bilingual? We should have every child speaking more than one language.

You know, it's embarrassing when Europeans come over here, they all speak English, they speak French, they speak German. And then we go over to Europe, and all we can say [is], "Merci beaucoup." Right?

You know, no, I'm serious about this. We should understand that our young people, if you have a foreign language, that is a powerful tool to get ajob. You are so much more employable. You can be part of international business. So we should be emphasizing foreign languages in our schools from an early age, because children will actually learn a foreign language easier when they're 5, or 6, or 7 than when they're 46, like me.

There's nothing particularly exceptional about Obama's position, unless you are an English-only partisan cowering in fear of your cultural identity being swamped by funny-looking people from strange lands. Or one of the similarly insecure patriots who believe any criticism of the U.S. is a sign of "blame-America-first" treachery. And I suppose the whole comment about "going to Europe" opens Obama up to more charges of elitism, and disconnection from the lives of those who, right now, can't afford to even think about going to Europe.

But to most people who actually grasp the fact that we live in a complex, interconnected global economy, being able to speak more than one language just makes a lot of sense. Maybe those of us who do feel threatened by Spanish-language signs in government offices would sleep a little easier if we understood what they they were saying.

― Andrew Leonard

http://www.salon.com/tech/htww/2008/07/08/...bama/index.html

Nobody HAS to learn Spanish in this country, but if you look at job postings in a lot of areas, you're a LOOOOOOOOTTTTTTT more employable if you can speak both languages. The more languages you can speak, the more opportunites become available. Definitely a good thing.

I didn't read through the whole thread, so forgive me if I repeated what someone else has already said.

[amiquechu 0]

I agree with Senator Obama on this point.

It's absolutely vital that ALL Americans grow up with English, because English is our national language.

But it's also very useful for Americans to grow up learning another language. And I don't mean just offering a French class starting in ninth grade. Someone who waits until their teen years to start studying a language will likely never be truly bilingual, and will at least have a thick accent. Language study needs to start early in life, and continue.

Our society is well served by having some Americans who know a variety of languages. Spanish is an obvious choice for many, but I don't really care whether it's Spanish, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Urdu, or something else.

Even though some language knowledge may help some people get some jobs, that's not the only reason to do it. Every young kid in our schools learns American History. How many of them go on to be employed as American Historians? Kids learn baseball, music, art, and a bunch of other things that are less commonly useful on the job than a second language would be. The reason most kids should become bilingual is to give them cultural perspective, as much as anything. If it has a side effect of making them more employable, that's a great bonus.

We're working to try and raise our daughter to be truly bilingual. We don't want her to have a first language and a second language; we'd like her to have two first languages. It's not going to be easy.

Right on!

[Amby 490]

I don't speak English